Storing Dahlia Tubers the Old Fashion Way

An 8 foot dahlia? Now that I would like to see.

I can't help you with the "old fashioned" way. I have lost too many dahlias doing that in the past. I don't use the saran wrap method either. Rather, I clean the tubers up, wash them well, let them dry a little, dust with bulb dust, wrap in recycled plastic grocery bags ( with labels of the dahlias), put the bags of tubers into a cardboard box, and store that in my "rooting cellar". It works for me, with minimal work, recycle the plastic bags that gather in my home from all the grocery shopping, and I have great success keeping them.

I have found that storing the tubers in earth, the earth dries out the tubers too much, and I have less success than the way I have developed. I have also found that storing them in saw dust starts mold. Storing them in peat moss, I find dries them out too much.

Good luck with what ever method you choose. Dahlias are too pretty to lose.

I'll have an 8 footer ready for you as soon as the camera battery charges Jroot. I've had several in the 7-8 foot range, many 6 footers despite topping and using a lower nitrogen feed. They really foil your planting-with-height-in-mind plans in the garden! Poor little 3 ft fellows behind them get stilted from full sun.

Jim, you won't offend any true dahlia lovers by not disbudding. You would likely get a better single flower and a better stem to hold it if you did disbud, but if you just want visible flowers in your garden then let them grow as is.

If you read back the past couple years here, (if you can go that far,) you'll see plenty of folks who have success just tossing their tubers in a bag or a box in a dark corner of the basement or root cellar and all goes well in Spring.
I don't think there is any special technique involved from what I've read. Cut off, dig up, knock off much of the soil, let it dry a bit and stick them somewhere non-freezing.

I know I won't store in peat moss again as it lost me 95% of my tubers one year. (In fairness to the peatmoss, I think it froze for over a week here and I was callous to the fact that the tubers weren't insulated enough in Rubbermaid tubs in our frozen garage temps.)

I like the Saran wrap because it saves so much room and has done a wonderful job keeping tubers over.

Here are several tall monsters that grew this year. The beat up well-used ladder is 6 ft tall.

Haley Jane- labelled to be 4 ft.

Ferncliff Copper- This one didn't bother me being ~7 ft tall, it only shaded a rhododenron behind it, no dahlias.

And the tallest: Karma Sangria labelled to be 3 ft! There's Haley Jane again to the right. These two caused much havoc in my "3 footer" section, shading other dahlias so growth and flowers were only fair at best.

Hi Poochella!

As the say seeing is believing! I hope my photos will be as impressive when I get around to posting? I wrote the below and was ready to paste before I saw your 2nd reply with photos.

Jim

Hi jroot and Poochella and of course All!

Thanks for your replies. I sort of thought someone would think I was not serious about the 8' tall Dahlia plants because Ive never seen them before either. But it is the truth as Poochella said. I candidly thought I was doing something wrong. But I will say this; my wife thinks their beautiful and likes looking out the window at them, plus my next door neighbor told my daughter when she sits on her patio she feels like shes at a park.

Im so happy we missed the frost of Sat morning 9/30, here in the Syracuse NY area as I have a brother from Binghamton NY, actually Conklin which is 90 miles S of Syracuse who will be visiting this coming weekend. He too has never seen 8'ers.

Amazingly with a 1½ degree southerly latitude difference between his home and ours, his area is classified as Zone 4a/b where ours is Zone 5a. So that could possibly be a great deal to cause the tallness factor. Longer warmth and as much as a 2 to 3 week more of growing season can make a big difference Im sure. I gave him a tuber this Spring but his never materialized to that height.

I just went out to measure what I think is the tallest and it does measure just shy of 8', and Im sure with the temps in the low 50's to middle and upper 70's on a couple of days this week they'll reach beyond that height. I will get a couple of photos, hopefully today.

Another thing I would like to point out is without trying to embellish is, first, jroot like you this is a favorite Forum. The learning content is great and the photos are exhilarating, and Im envious of the photography. To be so gifted.

Second, as to the tall growth. I learned after the fact that its not so good to fertilize or should I say over fertilize. I'm sure it came via this Forum. Well, for the past two years Ive taken fresh horse manure, mixed it in a 5-gal pail until it was broken down and then added more until I had the pail almost full of manure. I then put this in my six cu ft construction wheel barrel and added collected rainwater. I fill the barrel at least twice and get possibly as much as 50 gals of liquid that I strain back into 5 gal pails. I also add five tablespoons of Miracle Grow to each pail. (Talk about over fertilization!)

Then with a watering can I pour at the base of each plant and generally have enough left over and pour over the plant itself. I did this three times during the growing season. One thing Ive recently noticed as I pass a few properties where Dahlias are visibly growing, is the leaf structure from the stem base ½ way up on many or most plants have already turned brown and crumbly dead looking. I have very little to no brown on my leaf structure. The same areas of growing but why the difference? Is it the soil PH or the rich mixture? I have not a phantom of an idea.

And 3rdly I have to add I enjoy reading the posts from this Forums Group. As much as I hate the thought of being just a few weeks away from Winter where our average snowfall is over 100", I cant wait to get caught up on the Groups Tips and Success after blowing out the driveway.

Believe me, Id rather be Gardening, and the Gardening Forum is the closest I can get :>)

Jim

Hi Jim. It is neat to hear that you are from upstate New York. My wife and I were just on a holiday at a resort near Samford. When we got up to leave on Saturday morning, the frost was SO THICK that I had to run the car for 10 minutes to melt it enough so that I could drive down the road to get my coffee. Beautiful country there. After that heavy frost, any wind and the leaves will be gone.

I look forward to seeing your photos. I enjoyed Poochella's . They were great. I'm envious.

This is my first year, too, and I've made several newbie errors but I DID pinch back all ten of my plants. I still had one grow to 10 feet(cross my heart!). I've already cut it back, though, so can't prove it. I had three others go to 8 feet. I didn't get a lot of flowers on these very tall plants so will pinch more violently next season. I'm anxious now to dig them up because we are relandscaping the yard and they're in the way but I'm afraid of taking them out too early. We haven't had a hard frost yet - it's 33 this morning. Will they be ruined if I take them out now? Just how important is the storage temp? We don't have a garage so they'll have to go in the basement which doesn't get very cold.

Just FYI - my basement is relatively warm, usually around 60. I store my dahlias in vermiculite in open containers or boxes or even paper bags. They do just fine, but it is a good idea to check on them once a month or so (blush - I rarely do).

Anna

Thanks, Anna. Our basement is about the same temp. They're pretty interesting plants and I was surprised and pleased with my first year results so I don't want to lose the precious tubers.

I pinch back my dahlias, and I have several that are in the 7-8' range as well. My Insipic is tall and VERY bushy - I can't even stake it up anymore, although I have to admit, it has done fine on its own - it is about 7' high and about the same wide! Doesn't make a great cut flower, but looks great on the cul-de-sac - tons of blooms all summer long.

I had my best year ever with dahlias - maybe because I planted so many, maybe because I planted them all in a quart of manure. Keeping fingers crossed for tonight and tomorrow nite - don't want to hear that "F" word (frost). If we make it through, we should have at least a week more which I need. Have way too many buds and some on plants that have yet to bloom!